“She abandoned her dance school and other business to become a sanyasin, but death took her unawares: she was killed in a landslide while on a pilgrimage to Kailash-Mansarovar. Oddly enough even as a sanyasin she was accompanied by one of her lovers.”

“She laughed and danced with the thought of death in her heart.”

“And now something strange happened to our Charlotte. While busy painting, as she always was, she fell asleep in the midday sun. And when she awoke, the finished portrait of her once so ardently beloved Daberlohn [ = Alfred Wolfsohn ] lay before her. However, she tore the sheet into a hundred thousand shreds.... she sought for an explanation... Then her glace fell on one of her old paintings representing Death and the Maiden. And suddenly she knew…”

“After a mile she complained about her feet and asked me to hold the wheel. As I did it she reached down and took off her shoes. Then she took the wheel again and threw one foot over the side of the Ford. At once her dress ballooned out, spanking her face. She tucked it under herself, but even so her brown thighs were exposed even to a pinkish underthing.”

“She wished she had a little yellow house of her own, with a flower box full of real flowers and herbs – pansies and rosemary – and a sweet lover who would swing dance with her in the evenings and cook pasta and read poetry aloud.”

“Dance with her, and she will forgive much; dance well, and she will forgive anything.”

“In her first passion, a woman loves her lover, in all the others all she loves is love.”

“Protima Gauri (as she renamed herself) had zest for living. She loved her men, her liquor and drugs. She had a large range of her lovers, most of whom she names.”

“He gave her his heart. She took it and placed it quietly in the pocket of her gown. No one observed what she did.”

“she tapped her finger and nothing happened and she thought she had lost her magic, but it had only changed and it took her awhile to figure it out.”